Monday, June 04, 2007

These things take time

As you well know, a project done right takes way longer than the latter. If we just slapped some paint on our front door and called it a day, we'd have been done weeks ago. Instead, we are doing a "This Old House" quality repair and it's taking a bit longer.

At left you can see the trim has been primed and painted with two coats of Sherwin Williams oil-based Bunglehouse Blue. We reserve the option to add a third coat. On Saturday I scraped all the excess paint off the glass and cleaned the windows. I like the new color.

Also, on Saturday I tackled repairing the buckling veneer on the front door. I used a razor knife and cut out the failing and rotting areas and then using contact cement, glued 2-3 layers of oak veneer into place. Here you see everything clamped up to dry. I also sanded the door and filled any holes or dings with wood filler.

We decided to get a new unlacquered solid brass kickplate, which is going to run us about $82.00. This proving my theory that projects we undertake always go overbudget because we always seem to find a way to add something else. But it will look really nice, last virtually forever, and fit the door better.

I know I could go searching for the right one on ebay or salvage, but we have too many other projects to get going on so we are paying for convenience this time.

What did Steve do while I was working on the front door? Install a 18000 BTU air conditioner in our tenants apartment. He made a custom ledge out of oak stained to match the trimwork that raises the a/c above the vinyl window frame. It is a thing of beauty. No a/c eyesores in our building.

Incidentally, our tenants seem to be working out pretty well. On Saturday one of them told me how much she loves the apartment and how her friends are all jealous. They are quite sweet and considerate so far.

9 comments:

It's looking good. Actually, that is an understatement. I have a lot of respect for how you two do things, definately a class act.

I have to confess that I'm a little jealous too. We had to "make things work" to get everything in line for the appraisal last week. There are a few things I still can't bear to look at yet. Sigh. Makes me feel like a copout.

Steve is going to do the same thing for our a/c units on the first floor this weekend. Since you are interested, I will post on it. I'll see if we can get a photo of it in the tenant's apt. but I am afrid they will think it's strange :o)